8Ball And MJG

Biography

US rap duo 8Ball aka Eightball (Premro Smith, Memphis, Tennessee, USA) and MJG (b. Marlon Jermaine Goodwin, Memphis, Tennessee, USA) emerged from Memphis in the early 90s. One of the first Dirty South rap acts to achieve a consistent level of commercial success throughout the southern states, the duo initially failed to make the national breakthrough fellow Dirty South acts such as Outkast and Goodie Mob achieved in the late 90s, although by the start of the new century their music had begun to make an impact on the mainstream charts.

8Ball and MJG grew up in the Orange Mound district of Memphis, Tennessee, a deprived area that afforded young black men little opportunity to progress. The duos love of hip-hop prompted them to launch their own recording career on the southern underground circuit, and they succeeding in building a large audience with a series of self-released recordings, including their first big hit...